As described in Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2001-223057, for example, there has been conventionally provided a connector comprised of a plug and a receptacle attached to distinct electrical apparatuses, respectively, for electrically connecting the electric apparatus attached to the plug to the electric apparatus attached to the receptacle. When a plug is inserted into an insertion concave portion formed on the receptacle, contacts held on the plug come into contact with posts held on the receptacle, thereby electrically connecting the plug to the receptacle.
Generally, when the plug is connected to the receptacle, the contacts of the plug may not contact with the corresponding posts of the receptacle but possibly contact with posts which correspond to the other adjacent contacts due to displacement of the plug relative to the receptacle in the width direction. In order to prevent the displacement of the plug relative to the receptacle in the width direction, in conventional connectors, the size in the width direction of a connecting portion of the plug is, for example, set to be the substantially same as that of the insertion concave portion of the receptacle. Then, the plug is moved with respect to the receptacle while bringing a plug housing in contact with a connecting portion of a receptacle body, for example, to align the connecting portion of the plug to the insertion concave portion of the receptacle.
By the way, the plug housing and the receptacle body are formed of synthetic resin having relatively low mechanical strength. Thus, in pulling the plug out of the receptacle, when a force is applied to the plug obliquely against the longitudinal direction, an excessive force is given to the aligned portion of the plug relative to the receptacle, thereby causing possible damage of the pug housing and/or the receptacle body.
As shown in FIG. 6, for example, in pulling a plug 1 out of a receptacle 2, when a rightward force is applied to the rear end of the plug 1, the front end of the right wall of an inserting hole 34 of the plug 1 comes into contact with a connecting portion 62 of the receptacle 2 and at the same time, the front end of a receptacle shell 7 comes into contact with a connecting portion 33 of the plug 1. Thus, by leverage using the contact position between the front end of the receptacle shell 7 and the connecting portion 33 of the plug 1 as a fulcrum, a large force is applied to the front end of the right wall of the inserting hole 34 and the connecting portion 62. As a result, the right wall of the inserting hole 34 of the plug housing 3 and the connecting portion 62 of the receptacle body 6 may be damaged. When the portions for preventing displacement of the plug 1 are damaged like this, the displacement preventing effect cannot be obtained consequently, and thus, due to the displacement of the plug 1 relative to the receptacle 2 in the width direction, a contact 5a contacts with a post 8b adjacent to a post 8a to be properly contacted.
Thus, when the size of each component is set so that the connecting portion 33 of the plug 1 may not be in contact with the connecting portion 62 of the receptacle 2 and the receptacle shell 7 even if the plug 1 is skewed as shown in FIG. 6, the displacement of the plug 1 relative to the receptacle 2 cannot be prevented, and the contact 5a may come into contact with the post 8b other than the post corresponding to the contact 5a. 